Hello! Welcome back!
I have another really good one on tap which I've been looking forward to doing for a while, though this is more of a buried- treasure that has never quite reached the "Classic" status it deserves: The animated TV special 'Olive, the Other Reindeer.' Made in 1999 by Matt Groening and his creative team for 'The Simpsons' and 'Futurama,' it is based off the 1997 kids' picture book of the same title by Vivian Walsh, yet greatly expands it.
We quickly meet our protagonist, Olive (Voice of Drew Barrymore), a plucky little dog who genuinely loves Christmas. It's now Christmas Eve, and although Olive is of course thrilled for it, her owner Tim appears disappointed with her that she doesn't chase cars, tear up flowerbeds, or do any other typical dog things. Then, to make matters worse, Olive and her pet flea Fido (Yes, you read that right) hear over the radio that Santa may have to cancel his flight and present deliveries after his reindeer Blitzen suffered an injury. On the radio, it's said that the only way Christmas can be saved is if Santa can make do with "All of the other reindeer." As Olive listens to this, she mishears "All of" as "Olive," and thinks it's referring to her, even though she's obviously a dog and obviously can't fly. She decides to head out to the North Pole and at least try to lend a hand, accompanied by Martini (Voice of Joe Pantoliano), a shifty yet kind ex- zoo penguin with a suitcase full of phony Rolexes and zoo pens and stationary that he had been selling.
However, not everyone's as eager to see Christmas saved as Olive and Martini are: Enter the special's villain, an evil Postman (Voice of Dan Castellaneta, best known as the voice of Homer Simpson) who loathes Christmas because of all the extra mail he has to deliver. Upon learning of Olive's intent, the Postman becomes determined to stop her from reaching the North Pole and ensure that Santa's sleigh remains grounded this year. When Olive and Martini arrive at Arctic Junction, the Postman attempts to kidnap her, delaying her enough that she misses her bus to the North Pole.
So, she goes to a rather unsavory Arctic dive bar to get a ride from one of the guys there. While they at first are nasty to Olive, they soften towards her, especially a flightless reindeer named Schnitzel (Voice of REM frontman Michael Stipe, who of course sings a song in this) and a trucker with the amusing name of Round John Virgin who offers to give Olive and Martini a ride the rest of the way to the North Pole.
Olive manages to meet Santa (Voice of Ed Asner) and the reindeer, who decide to at least give her a chance. While this is happening, though, the Postman tries one last time to ruin Christmas, by swapping Santa's bag of gifts with a bag of junk mail and abducting Martini. Of course, Olive stops him, recovers the presents, and leads to a great Christmas for everyone.
I can only think of a couple small problems with this special. One is that the whole subplot involving Olive and her owner Tim (His disappointment that she's not like other dogs in terms of how she acts) was a bit unnecessary. Another is that Ed Asner's voice makes Santa sound too gruff, and not jolly enough.
That being said, there is still a ton to like about 'Olive, the Other Reindeer.' One of the first things is that it relies on a fascinating animation style. The best way to explain it is, while the characters visually look flat and two- dimensional (A lot like how they looked in the book, so they look like moving illustrations), the backgrounds and environments all look three- dimensional. It makes for quite an interesting style that I've never seen before or since.
There are loads of amusing sight gags and puns (i.e. the bus Olive boards to take her part of the way to the North Pole is called "Mauvehound," Olive at one point escapes from the Postman's clutches by finding a package addressed to her from "Deus ex Machina" which contained a tool that she used to get away) that kept me laughing all the way through, and ensured that it provides as much enjoyment for adults as for kids.
The songs used in this special are all catchy, well- written and fun to listen to, especially Schnitzel the Reindeer's song "We're Not So Bad," which amusingly enough has an intro that sounds a lot like the intro to the REM song 'Everybody Hurts' (In an interview about the special, Michael Stipe said that while the singing parts of course came easily to him, pulling off Schnitzel's spoken lines were surprisingly difficult for him to pull off, but he seems to do a good job with them), and "Merry Christmas After All," sung by Olive and the reindeer (With the reindeer's singing voices supplied by modern big- band group Big Bad Voodoo Daddy) in the end as they deliver the presents all over the world.
Now, let's talk about characters. Drew Barrymore brings her typical warmth and charm to playing the voice of Olive, making her into a brave, kind and sympathetic unlikely heroine who's easy to root for. Martini the penguin is a quite funny and resourceful supporting character who helps Olive out a lot along the course of her journey, and has a lot of the best lines in the special.
The Postman makes for an absolutely hilarious bad guy, probably one of the best Christmas- special villains I've ever seen. Dan Castellaneta does an awesome job with his voice (He in fact won an Annie Award for it), making him sound like a cross between Homer Simpson and Vincent Price. I always grin at how over- the- top he is, especially during his amusing villain song "Christmas: Bah, Bug and Hum" heard early in the special. Plus, many times in Christmas movies, the villains are people who hate Christmas just because they're jerks, but the Postman actually has a pretty valid/ understandable reason for not being fond of the holidays, giving him an addded layer of depth.
And so, there you have 'Olive, the Other Reindeer.' A funny, heart- warming, and truly wonderful Christmas special which deserves a lot more recognition than it's been getting. It's currently up on Youtube, check it out when you can. See you in the next review (Which I'll do ASAP)!
